Generation Gap

By now, gentle readers, you've seen this post: Generation X Doesn't Want to Hear It (if you haven't, click that link and go a check it out. I'll wait). And you've read the comments. And the commentary. And you've formed your opinions on Mat Honan. Maybe you read it as a rant on Occupy Wall Street (personally, your MatchGirl sees how people did, but didn't think about it herself - probably since everyone she knows who is occupying anywhere is well over thirty). Maybe you read something different, something more...

I did.

Your MatchGirl, herself, is very sick of the GenY people who only speak of being GenY. As though that's their accomplishment. That they were born to a certain time. Companies need to bend to them. The world needs to change for them. They can throw a tantrum and get what they want. It's always worked that way, right?

Screw that.

I've got no problem with Millenials (GenY, whatever). A lot of you, dear readers, fit that demographic. Many of my closest friends do, as well. As do some of my talented colleagues and loads of people who I admire and respect.

But here's the difference, those people are out there. They are living their lives to the fullest. They are doing something for others. They are writing code and creating art and making music and changing the world, one step at a time. They are not sitting in their 9-to-5's complaining about how the world is not bending to their needs. They are not sitting there saying that because they are Millenial that everyone should work around them and their needs. They, in fact, don't go around singing that they are GenY from the rooftops.

They are out there.
They are doing.
They are just them.
And who they are is pretty cool.

But that's my complaint about the GenY that we see in the every day. In the media. In the comments of Mat's post.

To those members of GenY, I say: Stop whining. Start doing.

Generation X, of which your MatchGirl is a born in the 1970s, card-carrying member of, doesn't want to hear it. It's true. No one listened to our whining. No one gave us trophies or prizes or a decent living. We make less than our parents did. It's possible, if something doesn't change soon, that our children will be worse off than we are. Our idols are dead. Our high school fashions were terrible. We got a hot five minutes of fame from a book by Douglas Coupland. And then GenY got a little older and, for the most part, Generation X was forgotten.

Your MatchGirl is proud of who she is and where she's from. She's glad of things that she was able to experience, simply by the fact of when she was born. But it's not all that makes me me.

And if you are a member of GenY, it shouldn't be what you're identity is wrapped up in, either. Be you. Shine. Do good. Live well.

As to the rest?
Hell, man, age ain't nothing but a number.